“Why, it’s sheer mischief, sergeant,” cried Lennox. “Done with a sharp knife evidently.”
For the light now revealed something which the darkness had hitherto hidden from their notice. Another sack had been ripped up, apparently with a sharp knife, from top nearly to bottom. Another was in the same condition, and a little further investigation showed that every one had been cut, so that, on the farther side where all had been dark, there was a slope of the yellow grain which had flowed out, leaving the sacks one-third empty.
“Well, this is a rum go, sir,” said the sergeant, scratching his head with his unoccupied hand. “They must have got a couple of sackfuls away.”
“But why slit them up, when they could have shouldered a couple and carried them off?”
“Can’t say, sir,” said the sergeant.
Lennox turned back to the doorway, and his companion followed with the light.
“Hold it lower,” said Lennox, and the man obeyed, showing the grain they had first noticed lying scattered about, while a little examination further showed the direction in which those who had carried it off had gone, leaving sign, as a tracker would call it, in the shape of a few grains which had fallen from the loads they carried.
“Follow ’em up, sir?” said the sergeant. “It would be easy enough if it keeps like this.”
“Yes,” said Lennox. “We should know then if it was the Boers.”
The man stepped forward with the door of the lantern opened and the light held close to the ground, making the bright yellow grains stand out clearly enough as he went on, though at the end of a minute instead of being in little clusters they diminished to one here and another there, all, however, running in one direction for some fifty yards; and then the sergeant stopped.